Maxine Clark on Bridging the Delmar Divide with Social Entrepreneurship

Maxine Clark, the well known philanthropist and creator of Build-a-Bear Workshop, is leading a redevelopment project to transform an old hospital on Delmar into a co-working and residential space for social innovators.

Delmar Divine will offer affordable space in a convenient location between the Loop and the Central West End.

This is one of several projects going on at the Clark-Fox Family Foundation, which develops innovative solutions to education, health and social issues in the community. The foundation worked with a public charter school in the West End Neighborhood, and when Maxine noticed the old hospital site was vacant, she realized an opportunity.

In our conversation, Maxine explains some of the challenges facing nonprofit startups in St Louis.

She believes that some can be solved with better communication between organizations — to share and develop ideas. By bringing different organizations and entrepreneurs together under one roof, Delmar Divine will likely become the new center of social innovation and collaboration in St Louis.

Drew Davis is the creator and host of STL Community Cast, a podcast that examines innovative and impactful projects in St Louis. In each episode, Drew converses with a project leader to uncover the purpose and passion driving their work, and the impact of the project in St Louis and beyond. To keep up with cool projects and hear directly from the visionaries behind them, subscribe to STL Community Cast on your podcast app of choice, or connect with Drew on Twitter and Soundcloud.